Trainees from Japan’s Coast Guard Academy are in Hawaii as part of a training cruise that is taking them across the Pacific.

They’re sailing on the Japanese coast guard’s training vessel the Kojima, which Japanese officer candidates have used for more than three decades as they prepare to take on the responsibilities of search and rescue and environmental protection missions. The 31-year-old Kojima arrived in Honolulu Harbor on May 21 as part of the aging ship’s final voyage.

But while the Kojima’s mission is ending, the Japanese coast guard is stepping up operations and expanding partnerships around the Pacific.

“This ongoing training plays an important (role in) building relations with Japan and other countries, so it’s an honor to have opportunities here,” said Cadet Ryoko Nagami, a future Japanese coast guard officer sailing aboard the Kojima.

While in Hawaii the Japanese cadets visited Pearl Harbor on Thursday and laid a wreath at the USS Arizona Memorial to pay tribute. Japanese coast guard Cmdr. Yuichi Kajiya told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that the stop at Pearl Harbor was critical to give the future Japanese leaders perspective on history and to participate in reconciliation between two once bitter enemies that are now increasingly close allies.

Kajiya arrived in Hawaii in 2023 to take on the newly formed position of coast guard attache at Japan’s Honolulu Consulate as issues at sea become an increasing point of focus for leaders in the Pacific. That has increasingly put the role of Pacific coast guards in the forefront in international relations and national strategies.

The Kojima sailed from Japan and made its first stop in San Francisco before making its way to Hawaii. After leaving Honolulu it will make stops in Guam, Palau and Singapore before returning home.

While the Japanese cadets were exploring the Bay Area, officials from the U.S., Japanese and South Korean coast guards met in Alameda, Calif., on May 12 to sign a trilateral agreement committing to closer cooperation and working together to assist coast guards and maritime police in Southeast Asia and Oceania.

During a reception Thursday night aboard the Kojima in Honolulu Harbor that brought together Japanese, U.S. and other officials from across the islands, Japan’s Hawaii Consul General Yoshinori Kodama said that “this network of coast guards is becoming so important in this region, especially at this difficult time with such a complex situation in the Indo-Pacific region.”

The cooperation had already begun in earnest. When the oil tanker MT Princess sank off the Philippines in February 2023, spilling 260,000 gallons of industrial fuel, the disaster response effort brought in ships from U.S., Japanese and South Korean coast guards along with experts from all three countries to help Philippine authorities clean up the toxic mess.

But concerns extend well beyond search and rescue and environmental cleanup. In 2023 the U.S., Japanese and Philippine coast guards held their first-ever joint exercise.

Clashes have increasingly broken out in disputed waters claimed by China and the Philippines. A 2016 international court ruling in favor of the Philippines found that China’s claims had “no legal basis,” but the Chinese military has doubled down and built bases on disputed islands and reefs, and has frequently harassed and attacked Philippine fishermen and maritime workers.

In recent months Chinese coast guard ships have escalated those efforts, attacking with water cannons and pushing farther into waters claimed by the Philippines, while the Philippine coast guard has tried to hold the line. This month the Philippines inked a more than $400 million deal to buy five new coast guard vessels from Japan.

Meanwhile, the Japanese coast guard has been stepping up its own operations at home amid an ongoing dispute between Beijing and Tokyo over an island chain claimed by both countries — known to Japan as the Senkakus and by China as the Diaoyu Islands — as both countries claim fishing rights in the surrounding waters. Last week the Japanese government said Chinese coast guard ships have been spotted there for a record 158 consecutive days.

Many of the conflicts over territorial rights in the Pacific have played out in the realm of fisheries, with Chinese coast guard ships and fishing vessels regularly getting in standoffs and confrontations with fishermen from neighboring countries in disputed territories. Coast guards across the region have jurisdiction over fisheries and management of international fishing fleets.

Aboard the Kojima on Thursday, Kodama told assembled guests at the ship’s reception that “the importance of the partnership amongst like-minded countries (and) coast guards is becoming so important in order to maintain the rules-based order in this region, and also in order to maintain a free and open international and regional order based upon the law as well as upholding our values.”

Along for the ride with the Kojima are a handful of U.S. Coast Guard Academy cadets who joined them in San Francisco, including one with Hawaii ties. Cadet Reina Nagata’s father is from Hilo, and she has family across the islands though she grew up in Gig Harbor, Wash. During the Honolulu port call, she has had a chance to catch up with family in Hawaii.

“It was so great. I haven’t seen them since COVID. It’s been four years since I’ve seen most of them,” said Nagata.

Nagata speaks some Japanese and has been improving her language skills while aboard the Kojima. She said her experience sailing and training with Japanese cadets has “been amazing, truly like the best time of my life. Meeting all these people is super cool.”

Before this voyage most of her education and Coast Guard training has been along the Atlantic seaboard, and she said she’s relished the opportunity to return to the Pacific.

“The Pacific is where I belong,” she said. “I love being here. It’s a whole different atmosphere being on the West Coast, the Pacific, than it is being on the East Coast. I’m very happy to be back.”

The U.S. Coast Guard, despite taking on increasing prominence in U.S. Pacific policy, has the smallest budget of any American military branch. At 43,000 active-duty members, the Coast Guard used to be the smallest military branch before the newly formed Space Force at just over 4,000. But the Space Force’s proposed budget next fiscal year of roughly $29.4 billion dwarfs that of the Coast Guard’s roughly $13.8 billion.

But Nagata said she thinks the Coast Guard is “underrated.” Her reasons for joining were deeply personal, having lost a friend in Washington state’s Puget Sound and having vivid memories of the Coast Guard conducting tireless search and rescue operations. She said the Coast Guard’s emphasis on saving lives and serving coastal communities is what drew her to the service.

“You see (people) at the store, you’re walking downtown, you see them on the street, you see them at the post office,” said Nagata. “I love the idea that I could be the one saving somebody else’s friend — I love that. Maybe I save someone and then I’ll see them the next week. It’s building those connections and keeping that community, it’s what I love about the Coast Guard.”